You're totally right Invictus, that people do have the right to say if they want to be touched or not. And it was good for L to see modeled that people do have the right not to be touched (we are pretty sensitive to that issue). If it had been my child, I would have given the child some language "no touching please" to use instead of shoving, especially because I was right there, saying to Leela "ask if you can hug first."

And my response was totally learned from Kelly - I love the story of how you redirected with Silas, and I try and use it whenever those issues come up.

And annak, I am trying not to be snarky! I like her and she thinks she's being nice, its just that she happens not to be right on this issue. I mean if you Google "ASL causes speech delay" you get nothing but posts debunking the idea. I just can't figure out how to say it in a way that doesn't sound defensive or mean, so maybe I just need to ignore.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

Maybe ask her for a source on this data? I would probably ignore it too, but it is more problematic since she is an educator. She is in a position to advise parents on behavior and choices to improve literacy skills. She is even giving you "reminders" and your child is not in her care. It's irresponsible for her to recommend that kids avoid signing. Signing is often recommended to help children with speech delays!

Butternut, I was thinking that! She's a Montessori educator, so I know she is working with so many toddlers and their parents, and I don't want her recommending (as she did to me) to keep signing to a minimum to encourage speech when that isn't necessary.

I wrote her this "Thank you so much for reaching out! I did a lot of research before we started ASL and just fyi, there have been no studies that have shown signing to hinder language or speech. In fact, all of the studies on signing with children show that signing accelerates language in many cases, and that it is unrelated to speech development. We do signing mostly to keep frustration to a minimum and because signing has been shown to give toddlers a sense of confidence and security because they can get their needs expressed and met. [lots of nice things about her kids]"

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

We were at the playground today and a slightly older kid kept cork blocking Malka on the slide, climbing back up after he went down it, running and pushing her aside when she was getting herself into position, etc. He was there with his nanny who was paying zero attention to him so I had to be all enforcer and (gently, with words) kick his asparagus out of the way over and over again. I really hate having to climb up on the jungle gym and enforce manners on strange children.

Butternut, I was thinking that! She's a Montessori educator, so I know she is working with so many toddlers and their parents, and I don't want her recommending (as she did to me) to keep signing to a minimum to encourage speech when that isn't necessary.

I wrote her this "Thank you so much for reaching out! I did a lot of research before we started ASL and just fyi, there have been no studies that have shown signing to hinder language or speech. In fact, all of the studies on signing with children show that signing accelerates language in many cases, and that it is unrelated to speech development. We do signing mostly to keep frustration to a minimum and because signing has been shown to give toddlers a sense of confidence and security because they can get their needs expressed and met. [lots of nice things about her kids]"

I think that sounds nice but direct, good job!

Ariann wrote:

We were at the playground today and a slightly older kid kept cork blocking Malka on the slide, climbing back up after he went down it, running and pushing her aside when she was getting herself into position, etc. He was there with his nanny who was paying zero attention to him so I had to be all enforcer and (gently, with words) kick his asparagus out of the way over and over again. I really hate having to climb up on the jungle gym and enforce manners on strange children.

I hate this most about the playground. I don't want to be a helicopter parent, but there are so many absent parents where we hang out, I really have to keep a close eye and redirect kids that are strangers to me. When I say that I mean even if the parents are actually physically present, they seem to be tuned out and not parenting. So when a five year old pours an entire bucket of sand on babynut's head and ARGUES that he is in the right...I'm looking around for the parent or nanny to at least acknowledge it is not okay to pick on a baby...nowhere to be found. Yuck.

Oh that is horrible Bnut! Poor Babynut. I can't believe the five year old thought it was okay to do that and then argue about it with you and no one stepped in.

I am a total helicopter parent - I am up on the jungle gym, I am right by her at every step, because I do get nervous about someone hurting her and our structures have open areas, that she could easily drop a foot or two onto the rubberized floor. That said, about a week ago, a bigger kid (who didn't belong in the toddler playground) ran up the slide and pushed Leela out of the way, so Leela smacked her face. At which point, I had to bite my tongue not to validate her behavior, given that I would prefer she not learn to hit people in the face when she is annoyed at them. The older kid then looked to me to intervene, so I just said very neutrally that we don't run up the slide when someone is waiting and we don't shove children that are smaller than we are and then to L that we don't hit people in the face. The playground is really quite Hobbesian.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

Sigh. Playground politics are so much more intense when you're the mom and not the nanny. I really thought I was prepared for this part of child-rearing, but ha. After her recent experience, F is really reticent about playing around other active kids now. I'm right in there with her, and hoping this too shall pass, but it makes me sad to see her afraid of some other child. :(

As for the baby sign/Makaton/ASL/language debate..I'd be curious to see if she responds to the "put up or shut up" idea. We too, researched a lot both when I nannied and before F was born. I was concerned that two spoken language and sign might overwhelm her, but could find no evidence of this. While she's just one child and it's anecdotal evidence, yada yada...*clearly* baby sign has not deterred her from the spoken word.

Yes, there is so much silliness from people on speech. And everyone is an expert. The real expert, who actually saw my son, had no issues with sign and was encouraging it. And I am so sick of people giving me their opinions on bilingual babies and speech delay.

That is so good to hear! Yes, everyone is an expert and everyone seems to feel free to give you advice even if you haven't asked for it, they don't know your circumstances past a few characters on Twitter or FB and the advice they are giving is wrong and could be refuted by even a minute long Google search. Oy.

How is Carlos doing now? Does he need any follow up at all?

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

Pretty well. The speech therapist just said to follow-up in 6 months to make sure things are going well. She counted a lot of stuff as words that we weren't counting including all his signs and animal noises. Today I was reading one of his books with an owl and he hooted like an owl without prompting. Basically, it counts as a word if it is something consistent that is meant to mean something in particular.

One of the two-year olds I nanny for has consistently taken a nap from 11-1ish for a really long time and she hasn't napped at all the past two days. I expected her to be super cranky without a nap but she's been pretty normal. I'm terrified she's just never going to nap again. Someone reassure me please.

_________________"No one with hair so soft and glossy could ever be bad at anything." - Tofulish

One of the two-year olds I nanny for has consistently taken a nap from 11-1ish for a really long time and she hasn't napped at all the past two days. I expected her to be super cranky without a nap but she's been pretty normal. I'm terrified she's just never going to nap again. Someone reassure me please.

Silas goes through spells like this and then a few days later goes right back to being exhausted midday and needing to nap again. Hopefully you'll have the same luck!

Miles is almost 2 and goes through non napping spells. The days he doesn't nap he is usually fine and happy all day and then falls asleep while eating dinner. Its adorable. The days he doesn't nap also scare me that he will never nap again because his older sister stopped taking naps cold turkey at 22 months old. It was horrible.

Malka does the same thing - doesn't seem tired at all at normal nap time, bright and happy, passes out on the couch at like 5pm (and then wakes up two hours later!).

Today we are really dragging. We're on the second day of a two-day Jewish holiday and the first night of it we stayed up all night at synagogue (on purpose) and Malka stayed with my MIL. Unfortunately plans for someone else to watch her so we could sleep it off have fallen through and she is not at all amused by us napping on the couch and letting her play. And last night I got a burst of energy really late and spent time cleaning the apartment instead of sleeping. This morning she woke up early and was crabby half the day, did the mini-nap thing running errands in the car, and is only now taking a real nap. Not sure how we're going to get through the weekend!

On naps..we are just playing around with trying to move to one nap/day vs. two (at 17+ months!). My poor bean just can't do it yet though. We tried today with a morning at the park, cafe, etc. and she was exhausted by 10:30ish (was shooting for 11). Awake around 1, but then that looong afternoon until 7 is just too much and she gets weepy and sad. So, two naps a day it is for now.

The playground thing...some kid (2 1/2 years) gave her a two-handed shove maybe 3 weeks ago now, that scared the crepe out of her, me and the pusher's mom. She nearly went out of an open space that is the entryway for kids after they climb ...this thing: http://img.archiexpo.com/images_ae/phot ... 697993.jpg. She was saved from a 3 foot plunge (bouncing on metal bars), by her height and hitting the top bar of the frame. Later, I think that mostly her balance was thrown off because the kid buckled her in two and when her head leaned forward, she started to fall and then caught herself. She went back on the frame later and I climbed with her and she seemed okay, but now she's going through this whole fear phase (trucks..which she generally loves, dogs, bugs, other kids). Trying not to psychoanalyze her too much.

Oh refin, that sucks! We have something similar, and I'd be terrified if I saw L heading through it.

Ariann, hahaha - I felt that way, but obvs we can't encourage kiddos to use violence ever. But I know who she gets it from, because sometimes I have to leave the playground because I am getting stabby watching her get shoved by other kids, though really at both Brookdale and Edgemont kids are really well supervised.

In our local (shittyneighborhorrid) playground, lots of people just don't care what their kids do. Two kids were throwing a baseball between the baby swings - so they could easily have hit L - and their mother, who was there with four children, was playing on her phone and refused to intervene. We had to leave the park, even though L wasn't ready to leave, because I felt that it was a safety issue.

_________________My oven is bigger on the inside, and it produces lots of wibbly wobbly, cake wakey... stuff. - The PoopieB.

While I understand the teaching of "dont use violence ever," there are obvious exceptions where you have to defend yourself against someone using violence on you. Don't know that a toddler can grasp that distinction, though. After all, Malka still doesn't get how it is not actually funny to hit us.

And she didn't actually take a nap this afternoon after all. It's been fun.

Dear poopieboy - do you have to want to nurse EVERY time I sit down? Sometimes I want my computer in my lap. Or maybe I could read something that doesn't consist primarily of pictures. Or perhaps I could sit down occasionally just to rest? And do nothing? Also, I really thought the days of choosing my wardrobe based solely on how easy it is to remove one or both of my breasts from it were over, but APPARENTLY NOT.

Also, I really thought the days of choosing my wardrobe based solely on how easy it is to remove one or both of my breasts from it were over, but APPARENTLY NOT.

Oh, I know this feeling. He is almost three, isn't he? (Or maybe I'm imagining.) You are well on your way to picking any kind of clothing you want! I have a summer dress that doesn't open AT ALL for breastfeeding, and I want to kick myself for not noticing that when I bought it. Anyway, hope you get a few moments of peace.

_________________when you realise how perfect everything is, you will tilt you head back and laugh at the sky. -buddha